


Do Not Eat Gail

by fransunflower



Category: The West Wing
Genre: Awkward Romance, Domestic Fluff, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Humor, Funny, Humor, Idiots in Love, Love, Post-Canon, Romance, Romantic Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-26
Updated: 2020-10-26
Packaged: 2021-03-08 20:14:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,607
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27212500
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fransunflower/pseuds/fransunflower
Summary: Danny brings home a furry friend and C.J. is not happy about it.
Relationships: Danny Concannon/C. J. Cregg
Comments: 6
Kudos: 17





	Do Not Eat Gail

**Author's Note:**

  * For [octothorpetopus](https://archiveofourown.org/users/octothorpetopus/gifts).



> Just a little fluff because I miss C.J. and Danny.

C.J. searched for the keys to their house but finally found them, buried deep inside her bag. She fished them out and unlocked the door.

"I'm home!" she yelled as she threw her bag on the kitchen table. "Danny?" She walked into the living room but still no sight of Danny. Strange.

"Hello, gorgeous," she suddenly heard him say behind her. C.J. spun around.

"Hey, Danny, how was your – what is that?" In his arms Danny was holding a tiny kitten, kissing its nose as he kept talking to it in a voice one might use when speaking to a small child.

"Oh, hey, C.J.," Danny said when he saw her. C.J. eyed him suspiciously.

"Danny, what're holding?" she asked even though it was fairly obvious. Danny held the animal out to her.

"A kitten," he said happily.

"Why?" She didn't touch the cat even though it looked at her with big, sad kitty eyes. She wasn't going to fall for that. No, no, no.

"I found it," Danny informed her and sat down on the sofa.

"Where?"

"What do you mean, where? Outside." Danny was hardly looking at her, he was too busy stroking the cat between the eyes.

"So you just… took it with you?" C.J. wasn't quite sure she was hearing this right. "It could belong to anyone. Maybe you just stole a nice family's cat. Maybe there's a five-year-old boy crying in his room right now because of you. You… cat-stealer." Danny looked up at her, his eyebrows raised.

"Cat-stealer?"

"Give me a minute and I'll come up with something better."

"I'm sure you will," he said and turned his attention back to the cat.

"But seriously, Danny where did you-" she began but Danny cut her off.

"Relax, C.J., I did not steal some five-year-old boy's cat."

"Then where-"

"She was in a box in the parking lot of the supermarket."

"A box?" C.J. raised her eyebrows, still not sure what to think of this.

"A box, yes."

"She might have crawled in there."

"There was a sign."

"A sign?"

"A sign, yes – C.J., could you stop repeating everything I say?" C.J. bit her lip.

"Sorry," she mumbled. They were quiet for a moment; Danny looking at the cat, the cat looking at C.J., C.J. looking at Danny. It was all very strange. "Well, we're not keeping it," C.J. decided.

"What, why not?" Danny seemed upset and he held the cat closer to his chest as if she was about to walk over and rip it from him.

"We're not getting a cat," C.J. insisted. "We have Gail."

"And?" Danny looked at her in amusement.

"Gail's a fish."

"So?"

"Cats eat fish."

"She's not gonna eat Gail," Danny assured her, looking like he was trying his best not to laugh. C.J. sighed, knowing when she was defeated.

"She better not," she said before turning around on her heel and stalking into her office. She could still hear Danny talking to the kitten as she walked away.

In her office, C.J. got out some paperwork she had been hiding in one of her drawers, hoping that would magically make it go away. It did not.

As she sat, head bent over the many many pages, C.J. heard a small thud. Her head snapped up and when she looked to her right, she saw the cat, standing on her desk, studying her curiously.

"What do you want?" C.J. asked, not really expecting an answer. The cat tilted its head. It was orange, with a little white dot on its chest and blue eyes. It lifted its paw as a greeting, although C.J. was sure that was not what it had indented. Suddenly the cat spotted the fishbowl on the other side of C.J.'s desk. "Don't you even think about it," C.J. warned but the cat had already leapt across her computer and was now looking through the glass, its nose pressed up against it. C.J. watched the animal carefully, not daring to take her eyes off it. The cat sat up straight and put its small paws on the edge of the bowl.

"Ey!" C.J. pointed her finger at the kitten. "Do not eat Gail." The cat titled its head before leaning forward and sniffing C.J.. It removed its paws from the bowl and walked over to her, jumping in her lap. C.J. immediately picked it up and placed it on the floor only to have it jump up again. C.J. sighed and stood up, holding the cat in front of her as if it was a ticking bomb. She made her way into the living room where Danny was sitting and reading his book. In that moment, she could have liked to take David Copperfield and slap him around the head with it. "Here," C.J. said and held out the cat to him. "I can't work like that." Danny smiled and took the animal from her. It immediately started purring in his lap. C.J. rolled her eyes.

"Did you annoy Mommy?" Danny asked in the same irritating voice he had used before.

"I'm not its mommy," C.J. insisted. "Oh, and I have a name for it by the way." Danny looked up, smiling.

"Oh, yeah? What's that?"

"Toby," she declared. "Always sticking its nose in things it's not supposed to."

"It's a she," Danny protested.

"The cat doesn't care."

"Fair point." C.J. looked at them for a moment, debating whether or not she should return to her work. She decided against it since she really had no interest in managing the budget and would probably ring Charlie and get him to do it. So C.J. let herself fall down on the sofa next to Danny and Toby The Cat.

"Do you want to go outside?" Danny asked, as he ran his fingers along her thigh. "The weather's still nice."

"Mhm," C.J. said, her eyes closed. Danny got up and kissed her nose before stepping outside through the big glass doors that faced the garden. C.J. followed him, as did Toby, and sat down in one of the chairs by the pool. While the cat went out to explore the rest of the garden, Danny sat down next to her, his hand finding hers before he bent down to kiss her.

"Hey," he murmured against her lips.

"Hey," C.J. whispered back.

"How was your day?" Danny asked as he laced his fingers through hers. C.J. shrugged.

"It was fine. I was in a meeting that should have taken one hour but ended up taking three and then I got home, and my husband had stolen a cat from the street."

"A box," Danny corrected her, circling the wedding ring on her finger.

"Whatever, nimrod." C.J. pulled him closer, her lips meeting his. They were soft and warm and tasted of coffee and cinnamon and C.J. still couldn't quite believe that she was the one kissing them. Out here. In LA. In their house. In their garden. Danny pulled away after a moment and stood up.

"Coffee?" he asked. C.J. nodded and leaned back in her chair as she watched him go. She lifted a hand to shield her eyes from the sun and glanced around the garden. She spotted the cat at the edge of the pool, carefully dipping its tiny paw in the water. She had to admit it looked kind of cute. Something she would never tell Danny, of course. He would have to live with her complain about that cat for as long as it lived. That was simply how it worked. C.J. watched as a butterfly flew past the cat, making Toby leap towards it. Everything after that happened very quickly. The cat, in an attempt to catch the butterfly, jumped up and landed headfirst in the pool. C.J., fully dressed, sprinted towards Toby as fast as she could and practically fell into the water. When she came up again, gasping for air, the cat was nowhere to be seen.

"Toby?!" she yelled, feeling utter ridiculous with her clothes clinging to her body like that.

"C.J.?" Danny asked then. He was standing by the edge of the pool, holding two cups of coffee, smiling at her. "Why are you in the pool?"

"The cat-" C.J. began but stopped herself when she spotted it, sitting at the edge of the pool, licking its paws. It was wet, sure, but still alive. C.J. sighed and hid her face in her hands. "The cat fell in the pool," she explained.

"The cat's right there," Danny pointed out.

"I can see that."

"Then why don't we get you out of the pool?" Danny laughed as he put the two cups down.

"Thank you, Daniel, that hadn't occurred to me," C.J. said as she climbed out of the water, remembering the last time she had fallen into a pool wearing all her clothes.

"You okay?" Danny asked, still smiling, as she was safely up on dry land.

"Yeah," C.J. told him. "Just a bit wet."

"You'll live."

"Probably." Danny laughed a little and removed a strand of wet her from her face. "I should probably change."

"Yeah." Danny squeezed her hand and let her walk away. But before she reached the door she turned around and called: "Oh, and Danny?" He looked up at her, the stupid cat already in his lap.

"Yes?"

"We can keep the cat."

THE END

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you liked this. Reviews are very much appreciated!


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